Behind the Mask
by ArtsyChick
Summary: Compared to Hatake Kakashi, Gai always felt hopelessly inadequate. But when a funeral leaves Kakashi on shaky ground, he realizes that perhaps he isn't so different from the son of the White Fang after all.


**A/N: **So I wrote this story about Gai and Kakashi about three years ago and, looking back at it, I'm truly embarrassed by how poorly written it is. I like to think I've improved greatly since then, so I rewrote the entire thing and am resubmitting it. Hopefully it's a little better the second time around. Forgive me if Gai's a little out of character; it's been awhile since I've watched any episodes with him. Anyway, I hope you enjoy this new, improved, and completely revamped version!

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><p>Raising his head, Gai peered toward the front of the assembly at the tall, gray-haired man with his head bowed low. As he watched, the Third Hokage walked up to the man and gently patted his shoulder, murmuring something to him. The man faintly nodded and the Hokage walked on.<p>

Beside him, Sarutobi Asuma nudged Gai's shoulder. "You think he's holding up?" he whispered, following Gai's gaze.

Gai shrugged. "I haven't gotten to speak to him yet," he whispered back. "I'll try when this is over."

Asuma nodded, the cigarette stuck between his teeth bobbing with the motion. "Good. I worry about that guy. He's always a little unstable after a funeral."

Someone shouted over the crowd and all the black-garbed shinobi moved to stand rigidly at attention. The gray-haired man slowly walked forward and, bending down, laid a single white chrysanthemum on the coffin before stepping back to join the uniform lines. The shinobi then saluted as one and the funeral was over.

oOoOoOoOoOoOo

Gai searched through the crowd frantically, desperate to locate his friend. However, as soon as they were permitted to stand at ease, he had disappeared from the line and faded into the background. Slapping a hand to his forehead in frustration, he strode to the front of the assembly and tapped the Hokage's shoulder.

"Hokage-sama," he said, bowing deeply when the man in question turned to him, "did you see where Kakashi-san went?"

The Hokage smiled bitterly. "He left as soon as the services were over," he said. "I didn't stop him."

"Did you see where he went?"

"I presume he went to the place he always goes."

Gai thought for a moment, confused, but then it came to him. Bowing again, he thanked the Hokage, turned around, and started running.

**oOoOoOoOoOoOo**

The KIA Shinobi Memorial was a large slab of gleaming ebony stone carved to form the hand of a giant sundial. The names of hundreds of shinobi were engraved into its polished surface, shinobi who had sacrificed their lives for the sake of the village.

Kakashi's fingers traced the newest name, added the day before. Black filings caught in his skin as his fingertips dipped into the engraving, and it was almost like he was touching her again.

"Rin," he murmured.

It was his fault she had died. If he hadn't been so distracted by her beauty, by her smile… He pressed his scuffed handguard to his forehead and groaned. If he hadn't been distracted _period_, maybe she would be visiting the memorial stone with him.

"I failed you," he continued as the characters began to blur in his vision. "I couldn't protect you…"

First Obito, then Minato-sensei, and now Rin. He couldn't even save his own father. What kind of shinobi was he when he couldn't even protect the people he loved most? If not them, how could he protect anyone at all?

"Rin," he moaned, his voice cracking. "I'm so sorry, Rin."

His knees buckled beneath him and he sank to the soft grass, burying his face in his hands. He ignored rule twenty-five, the rule that stated shinobi were not supposed to show emotion. He didn't deserve to be called a shinobi if he couldn't save the few people he cared about.

And then Rin's death seemed to sink in fully. She was truly gone. He would never see her smile again, or hear her voice or feel her hands gently press against his body, healing his injuries with soothing tendrils of chakra. Like all the rest of them, she was gone. The tears began to flow freely and Kakashi's chest was racked with sob after painful, broken sob.

"Why couldn't I save you?" he cried. "Why can't I save anyone?"

In a moment of feverish despair, he realized that maybe his father had the right idea. Maybe it would just be best to end it all, here and now. He had lost everyone he had ever loved and he was barely seventeen. What was the point in continuing to torture himself, to continue putting the lives of others in his hands only for him to lose them? To continue being an emotionless tool that followed orders without question?

The kunai felt unbelievably light in his hand. It offered an escape, a respite from his infinite sorrow and pain. He ran his fingertip along the sharpened edge and was delighted when it immediately drew blood. All he had to do was press the blade against his throat and it would all be over. He would get to see them all again…

Smiling faintly beneath his mask, Kakashi raised the kunai to his neck and closed his eyes. He wasn't afraid of the pain; he'd been tortured numerous times and had survived without spilling one single secret. Slowly, he began to dig in the blade and imagined his reunion with his beloved father and team.

Then, suddenly, his hand stilled and the pressure against his throat relaxed. Opening his eye, Kakashi glared down at the knife's handle and briefly wondered if his body was rebelling against him. But no. There was another hand clasped over his, a hand that was not his own. It couldn't have been—the fingernails were ragged and chewed to the quick, a nervous habit Kakashi didn't have.

His grip tightened on the hilt and he didn't bother to look up. He knew whose hand it was.

"Let go, Gai."

**oOoOoOoOoOoOo**

Ducking behind a tree to catch his breath, Gai peeked around the trunk toward the memorial. Standing in front of the polished stone was a tall, gray-haired man dressed all in black and staring downward. Gai knew immediately that it was Hatake Kakashi, his rival since their academy days—his wild mop of silver hair was far too distinctive for a shinobi.

For a moment, Gai thought Kakashi resembled his namesake. He reminded him of a scarecrow, quietly and patiently standing guard over his field and ready to scare anyone that dared defile it.

Kakashi reached forward and touched the monument, his hand lingering. Gai strained to hear his voice, surprised that Kakashi talked to himself. The son of the White Fang didn't bother speaking unless he was ordered or provoked—Gai had once seen him reduce an entire room of prospective Chunins to frightened tears with a five-word sentence—so to hear him talking to himself was strange. Besides, Gai believed Kakashi thought talking to oneself was a waste of effort and breath, like he was enforcing a personal word quota and refused to go one phrase over.

Slowly, Kakashi pulled his hand back and sank to the ground, drawing his knees up as his hands covered his face. Was he crying? Gai didn't know.

He frowned. _This_ was Hatake Kakashi, the child of the infamous and legendary Hatake Sakumo. The boy who became a Genin at five, a Chunin at six, a Jounin at thirteen—still currently an unprecedented and unbelievable achievement. He already graced several top positions in other hidden villages' shinobi handbooks as one of the deadliest ninja alive, marked with a stern warning to avoid engaging him in combat if at all possible. He developed a Kekkei Genkai that wasn't even his, a Kekkei Genkai that made him a formidable enemy even if he was only seventeen.

Gai recalled an incident back in their academy days when they had been paired as sparring partners. Kakashi had beaten him easily, his moves seeming effortless as he pinned Gai to the ground and aimed a kunai at his heart. Terrified of the boy's stoic features, Gai had panicked and started to cry, and Kakashi teased him about it for a month afterward. He continued to occasionally bring up the incident, especially when Gai was trying to impress cute foreign girls.

To see that stoic boy cry now was almost surreal. And yet, although Gai deeply resented Kakashi whenever he would start to tell that embarrassing story, he didn't feel a surge of satisfaction or triumph now that Kakashi was the one crying. Instead, he felt like crying too.

After watching him for a while, Guy decided he needn't be worried after all. It wasn't exactly comforting to see his esteemed colleague sobbing, but that was just the loss of his teammate sinking in and wasn't necessarily something to be concerned about.

And then something twinkled. Gai blinked and saw the watery sunlight gleam along the edge of a kunai as Kakashi withdrew it from the case strapped to his leg. The same fear and panic that had risen when Kakashi pointed a knife at his heart bubbled in his throat as he stepped out from behind the tree and started running toward him.

Boldly leaning over his shoulder, Gai wrapped his hand around the handle and yanked back. Despite the fact Kakashi only had a few seconds to hold it to his neck, the knife's edge had already sliced through the sheer fabric, revealed an oozing line of blood.

For a moment neither of them moved. Kakashi opened his eyes and seemed to glare at the blade before his eyes flickered to their overlapping hands. Then he spoke.

"Let go, Gai."

Gai shook his head fervently, his black hair swishing with the motion. "No," he said firmly.

Kakashi's voice deepened, his tone dangerous as he repeated the command. "Let go."

"I will not."

"What do you care?" he growled, not raising his eyes.

"Suicide is not the answer, Kakashi-san," Gai said, avoiding the question.

"Says you."

Gai narrowed his eyes. "You _know_ it's not."

He turned his head away. "My father would beg to differ."

Knowing he was entering a field of landmines, Gai took a deep breath and purposely triggered one that was blatantly exposed. "Your father was weak-willed."

Next thing he knew, Kakashi's fist was connecting violently with his nose. There was the crunch of cartilage as Gai was knocked off his feet and he feel to the grass with a thud. He blinked back the tears of pain and opened them to find Kakashi digging his knee into his shoulder and the kunai—still glistening with Kakashi's blood—hovering over the left side of his chest.

"Don't you _ever _insult my father," Kakashi ground out. "Nothing about him was weak."

Now that they were facing each other, Gai could see that Kakashi's right eye was red, the surrounding skin puffy. Tears streamed down his cheek, soaking the fabric covering his face, but now they seemed more angry than sad.

If he hadn't been pinned down, he would've jumped for joy. An angry Copy Ninja was better than no Copy Ninja at all, and Gai knew that the angrier Kakashi became the sooner he could overcome his despair. And everyone knew the quickest way to snapping Kakashi's heartstrings was through Sakumo-sama.

With this in mind, one side of Gai's mouth quirked up as he stepped on another mine. "Except his will to live."

Kakashi punched him again, and this time there was the crackle of bone to join the crunching. Gai could taste his bitter, metallic blood as it dripped into his mouth.

"You don't know _anything_ about him!" Kakashi shouted, the kunai's point actually digging into the stiff cloth of Gai's shirt.

"You're right," Gai said, "I don't know anything about your father." Kakashi blinked in surprise and the pressure on his chest eased. "But I know a little about you, Kakashi-san."

"What could you possibly know about me?" he hissed.

"I know that you would never abandon your comrades or village," he said. "You're too proud. Konoha is in your blood, just as it is in mine." He frowned. "Don't you think, by killing yourself, you'd be abandoning all the people you swore to protect?"

They stared at each other, but Kakashi's gaze broke first. Dropping the kunai, he lifted his knee from Gai's shoulder and turned back to face the monument. Gai sat up, wiped the blood from his mouth, and squinted at the hole the kunai had torn in his only black shirt. He poked his finger through the hole; at least he wasn't bleeding.

Crossing his legs, he sat beside Kakashi and stared at the statue with him. They sat in silence for a few minutes before Kakashi whispered, "I failed them, Gai."

Gai turned his head a fraction, but didn't say anything.

"I let them down," he continued, wrapping his arms around his legs and resting his chin on his knees. "Obito, Minato-sensei, and now Rin. I failed."

"No, you didn't," Gai replied matter-of-factly. "Failure is what you were about to do before I came up and grabbed that kunai. At least you tried to save them. You didn't bother to do yourself the same courtesy."

But Kakashi shook his head. "You don't get it, Gai," he said softly. "You still have your team. You've never risked your life for someone else and still lost. You've never lost someone you love."

"Again, you're right. I have never lost someone I love." Tilting his head up, he watched the gray clouds lazily drift through the sky, occasionally letting shards of pale sunlight sift through. "But I _have _failed more times than you can count. I didn't have a legendary father like you, Kakashi-san. You were always stronger than me. But I thought if I could beat the protégé, then maybe I could be a splendid ninja too."

He looked down at his lap. "But I couldn't," he said. "One day, I was ready to give up my dream. Minato-sensei was a still a teacher at the academy and I told him that maybe I wasn't cut out to be a shinobi. He folded his hands and looked at me and said, 'No one's cut out to be a shinobi. It's something that has to be earned, just like everything else.' Then he smiled and said, 'Just because you've fallen doesn't mean you have to stay down, Gai-kun. Once you've hit bottom, the only direction you can go is up.'"

Raising his head, he inclined it toward his rival, the young man he once thought he could never compete with. "What do you think, Kakashi-san?"

There was a pause. "I think Minato-sensei was a bad liar." Then he turned his head and looked at Gai. "But sometimes he was right."

A raindrop plinked off Kakashi's hitai-ate and dripped down to splash on his eyelid. They both glanced up as thunder grumbled above them and the clouds released the water that been accumulating all day.

Standing up, Gai held out his hand. After a moment, Kakashi gripped his wrist and let Gai pull him to his feet. The two boys shook out their hair, resembling freshly bathed dogs, and sprinkling the black stone with more droplets. Then they turned and started walking.

**oOoOoOoOoOoOo**

As they left the training ground, Kakashi glanced up and saw Gai was focusing intently on his sandals. He frowned. "Why?" he asked.

Gai looked up, his bushy brows pulled down in confusion. "Why what?"

"Why were you there?"

He shrugged. "I was friends with Rin-chan too."

Kakashi tilted his head. "Did Obito teach you how to lie? Because you suck at it."

Gai laughed. "Your brutal honesty pains me, Kakashi-san."

"Why were you there, Gai?"

He sighed. "Because I suspected you were going to do something stupid," he admitted, gazing down again.

If he hadn't been so tired and sad, he would've smiled. Instead, he reached over and lightly punched Gai in the arm. "The only stupid thing I've ever done," he said, "is be friends with you."

Gai's head jerked up and Kakashi could see he was about to protest. Then the full extent of what he'd said seemed to sink in and Gai's look of anger melted into one of awe. Kakashi was truly amazed he didn't burst into tears then and there.

They didn't say anything for the next ten minutes as they meandered their way past the academy and down one of Konoha's main roads. The rain continued to pour down onto them, plastering their mourning clothes to their individual frames, but Kakashi didn't mind. It felt good to be soaked in the clear, cleansing rain. His sadness began to drop away as he remembered how much Rin had loved the rain.

_It brings the world to life, Kakashi-kun_, she'd said. _It turns the world green and new again._

_But doesn't it make you sad? _he'd asked. _It reminds me of tears, as if the sky's crying._

_Well, you know what they say, don't you Kakashi-kun? _He'd shaken his head and she had smiled. _There's always sunshine after the rain._

When they reached a fork on the road, they stopped. Kakashi lived just up the left road, whereas Gai lived down the right. They stood awkwardly in the middle, kicking rocks with their sandals and avoiding eye contact.

"Are you going to be all right?" Gai finally blurted out.

Kakashi raised his head and nodded. "I always am, aren't I?" He kicked a rock and it skidded down the road, eventually colliding with a pole. "Thank you, Gai," he said suddenly.

Gai's head shot up. "For what?" he asked, incredulous.

He sighed. "For stopping me back there. You're right. Suicide's not the answer."

Tears welled in Gai's eyes and he grabbed Kakashi, dragging him into a tight hug. "Thank you for calling me your friend, Kakashi-san," he whispered.

Kakashi stumbled back with the force of Gai's happiness, but he slowly brought his arms up and patted Gai's shoulders. "Sure, Gai," he said. Gai sniffed loudly and he rolled his eyes. "But if you get snot on my shirt, I'll kick your ass."


End file.
